


I Will Be Myself

by katekane



Category: Anne of Green Gables - L. M. Montgomery, Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, Cross-Generational Queer Bonding, Explicit Consent, F/F, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Literary References & Allusions, Misses Clause Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-21 15:31:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17046215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katekane/pseuds/katekane
Summary: When Diana Barry learns that  Aunt Josephine was romantically involved with her deceased companion, Gertrude, she has what appears to be a homophobic meltdown. In reality, Diana is panicking because the realisation that bosom friendship needs not be of a platonic nature forces her to re-evaluate her relationship with Anne.This fic contains spoilers for season one and two of "Anne With an E", but takes some liberties regarding who says what to whom in canon.





	1. FEAR

**Author's Note:**

  * For [frnklymrshnkly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/frnklymrshnkly/gifts).



> At thirty-three I am too old for pulling all-nighters, but this story took on its own life and grew much, much longer than I anticipated. I hope you enjoy the pace it set for itself. And I wish you a happy Yuletide! 
> 
> * * * * *
> 
> Thank you for betaing, sea-change!
> 
> * * * * *
> 
> “'I am not an angel,' I asserted; 'and I will not be one till I die: I will be myself." - Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre.

”I don't think imagination is my strong suit,” Diana admits to the redheaded girl as unfamiliar to her as the garden they are wandering is well known.

The girl seems appalled at that. "I don't know what I would _do_ without mine! I like to imagine that I'm a princess in a tower or Joan of Arc riding into battle or a bride living by the sea who never speaks to anyone because her one true love disappeared." Her freckled face breaks into a wide smile.

Diana feels her own features mirror those of the girl. After all, it is only polite to make this newcomer feel welcome. "Wonderful! Do you think you could tell me a story right now?"

"I could tell you twelve!” The girl is all eagerness, until suddenly she is not. On the contrary, when she speaks again she is shy and hesitant. ”Diana… Do you think you could like me? Just a little?"

Diana tilts her head in confusion at the question. They are the same age, they are both girls; it is expected that they become friends. She reaches for the girl – Anne with an E – in a gesture of reassurance. "I already do!"

 

Anne keeps her promise and fills Diana’s life with stories.

In one story, they are grown up ladies having proper tea together. Diana switches into French, because it is the thing for a distinguished lady to do, and Anne is impressed. The fact that they end up inebriated and shout ‘bosoms’ and roll around in Anne’s bed together is an accident and as such of no importance.

In another story, based on the first, Anne imagines a farewell of such pathos it is as if they were characters in a book. They even call each other ”thee” and ”thou”. "Diana, will thou _promise_ never to forget me?"  
"I will never have another bosom friend. I don't want to. I could never love anyone as I love you.”  
"Then I will always love thee, Diana. In the years to come your memory will shine like a star over my lonely life."

In yet another story, and in a fourth and fifth story, they pretend to be heroes of a poetic era long lost. Through Anne’s imagination, Diana becomes Lancelot, the knight. She becomes Wisteria, the dashing and slightly wicked prince. And she becomes a nameless romantic figure able to use words such as ”luscious” when describing Anne’s lips, just before she goes back to being her innocently inexperienced fourteen-year-old self.

 

To each other, Diana and Anne keep a promise of bosom friendship that might last a lifetime. For Diana, this requires no imagination as she can draw from her Aunt Josephine’s example.

”She has come to stay with us for at least a month. She is grieving the loss of her companion. Her best friend forever and ever,” she explains to Anne as they walk arm in arm to school through a snow-clad forest. ”Neither of them married, so they lived with each other their whole lives.”

"I'd live with you forever if I could," Anne says, tilting her head. "But," she adds, "I _know_ you will leave me the day you get married to some _wealthy, handsome gentleman_. I hate him already."

Diana laughs and looks away. She enjoys Anne’s sense of humour.

 

*** * * * ***

 

“It’s _unnatural_ , Anne!” The force pushing the words from Diana’s lips is so great she fears it might tear her apart. She hugs her knees to her chest trying to contain it, to keep herself whole, but the force will find another escape. She can already feel it leaking from the corners of her eyes, and unless she lets out more harsh words she will surely cry. “Aunt Josephine kept her lifestyle a secret! That must mean _it’s wrong_!” The outburst does little to quell the sensation of exploding from within.

Next to her, next to Aunt Josephine’s large guest bed, Anne is uncharacteristically quiet. Her hand still holds that of their mutual friend, Cole, but the pair’s impromptu dancing has frozen. The colourful scarfs and strings of pearls around Cole’s neck have stopped mid-motion, and the flowers sat on top of Anne’s short-cropped hair no longer look real. The two of them have fit right in at Aunt Josephine’s summer soiree held defiantly in the middle of winter. Diana herself has felt out of sorts since they arrived, but been unable to pinpoint why. Something about the way paper-flowers hung excessively from the ceiling. Something about the women in top hats and the men in bright costumes. Something about the utter lack of rules. At least Anne’s fantasies follow some sort of script, Diana thinks. Here everything is in free fall.

Anne and Cole exchange glances, before Anne carefully sits next to Diana. Without looking up Diana feels her friend’s eyes on her, can sense how Anne is searching for the right words until she eventually settles for somebody else’s: “To my Gertrude. Someone will remember us, I say, even in another time. Forever you have my heart. Jo,” she reads from a worn book. Her look, when Diana finally dares to meet it, is pointed as if Diana were a particularly dense and stubborn child. She might as well act the part.

“But it doesn’t make _any sense_! Two _women_ could never have children!” she yells. She is on the brink of hysteria, and Anne and Cole seem taken aback and unable to follow her. Anne cannot even look at her right now. Diana is clearly alone in this, drifting in solitude on a ridiculously oversized bed.

Cole recovers first. "If your aunt lived her life feeling broken, defective, or-” he pauses, then repeats Diana’s word back to her ”- _unnatural_.” The word shimmers before them, above the bed, and to Diana it is larger than life. She might have spoken the word, but it must be a quote even if she does not know its source. Cole either ignores it or does not see it. ”Then one day your aunt met someone that made her realize there was nothing wrong with her. Shouldn't we be happy for her?"

It is a rhetorical question, Diana knows; she is supposed to agree with Cole, but she cannot. Because that would mean answering a different question simultaneously: the one pressing on her lungs and the back of her eyes, the one requiring an imagination she always thought she lacked. Now, however, that imagination has been handed right to Diana by Aunt Josephine and her dear Gertrude; her _lover_.

”I think it’s spectacular! There is so much more possibility,” Anne says right next to Diana, but it is as if she speaks through water and from afar. Diana is not hearing her friends. She is looking neither at them nor any of Aunt Josephine’s furniture. Rather, she is seeing something invisible to anyone else in the room: Her own history in a new, clear light she never asked for.

 

* * * * *

 

”I don't think imagination is my strong suit,” Diana admits to the redheaded girl who is as unfamiliar to her as the garden they are wandering is well known. She finds herself wishing for imagination for perhaps the first time in her thirteen years of existence. Something about this girl, who calls herself Anne with an E, is making her curious in ways no other person has.

"I don't know what I would do without my imagination, life would be an agony!” Anne breaks into a wide smile as she relays her favourite fantasies. They all cast her as a romantic heroine that sound nothing like the passive princesses of Sleeping Beauty or Snow White. On the contrary, every part of Anne is in motion as she swings the imaginary sword of Joan of Arc. Diana feels herself being pulled in not so much by the stories as by this strange girl herself. She is wiry and flat chested, her hair wild, and the freckles covering her face seem to be dancing. The latter is probably a trick of the light, but Diana has an urge to place her palm on Anne’s cheek and feel for herself. If the girl would stand still long enough, that is, which seems unlikely.

”Do you think you could like me? Just a little?”

The question feels out of the blue, because Diana is already long past liking Anne. She knows they will become important to one another, not simply because they are girls of the same age, but because Diana is magnetically drawn to Anne. This is why she touches Anne’s hands; not to reassure her new friend, but because her fingertips tickle with a restless energy that does not dissipate until skin is upon skin.

Anne keeps her promise and tells Diana imaginative stories, but to Diana they are always more than scenes from a book.

When they have tea together, the way distinguished grown up ladies would, Diana switches into French not so much because it fits with Anne’s story, but because she wants to impress her friend in the real world. Her wish is fulfilled when a wide-eyed Anne responds with: "Could there be _anything_ better than you speaking a _romantic language_? My two _favourite things_ together…" At that point Diana has not had enough cherry wine to blame the heat in her cheeks on anything other than the way Anne is looking at her.

She could blame it on the wine later on, when she shouts out ‘bosoms’, but the truth is her gaze has been lingering on the barely there slopes of Anne’s chest for a while. Likewise, it is not the warm sensation of the wine in Diana’s belly, but the restless energy in her fingertips that make her pull at Anne until they stumble into bed in a pile of limbs so uncoordinated that one of Diana’s hands accidentally graze that small slope which proves softer than anyone, imagination or not, could have foreseen.

 

When Diana’s mother wants to keep them apart and Anne suggests they bid each other farewell in the way romantic protagonists would, there is nothing made up about Diana’s confessions. Instead of saying ”thee” or ”thou” as if quoting a book, she slips up repeatedly and simply speaks her mind.

"I will never have another bosom friend. I don't want to. I could never love anyone as I love you.”

And for a moment it seems Anne, too, is slipping up. "Do you _love_ me?” Her eyes are wide, her language her own. ”I thought you _liked me_ , of course, but I never hoped you loved me," she stammers, and Diana feels her heart sore.

"I love you devotedly, Anne," Diana says to assuage Anne’s obvious insecurity, but mostly because she means it.

Anne’s blue eyes stare back at her with no big words to distract either of them. Then Anne blinks, and the words are back. When she promises to "always love _thee_ , Diana,” Diana is not sure whether she is hearing Anne or Anne’s imagination. But Diana accepts her friend’s embrace just the same; clings to her, breathes her in, allows restless fingertips to settle on the small of Anne’s back.

 

Diana cannot help but notice how Anne always casts her as the male lead in spite of the fact that Diana’s puff sleeves are larger than Anne’s will ever be. She also notices that she herself never minds.

As Lancelot, the noble knight, Diana has an excuse to bend over Anne and kiss those freckles she can barely keep her eyes off.

As Wisteria, the wicked prince, she can defy the norms of her upbringing and take the romantic initiative rather than wait for someone else to do it, some _boy_ whose initiative Diana is not in the least interested in.

As a member of The Avonlea Story Club, Diana gets a thrill not so much out of words, but of Anne’s way with them. How they sound from her lips; how they make her eyes twinkle. Diana does not master language in quite the same playful way. To her, words are a means of communicating truth. Like when Anne is chewing her plump bottom lip deemed ”a fat caterpillar”: to Diana those lips truthfully are ”perfectly pink and luscious.” When Anne responds in kind with: “You without a doubt have the most kissable Cupid’s bow,” Diana does not delight in the metaphor as such; she thinks of kissability _literally_ and has to avert her eyes from the lips that elicited the thought. Then she has to look up again, because the magnetism present from their first meeting has since then grown in strength. Anne is smiling gently at her; there is a freckle at the corner of one of those luscious lips and Diana wants to taste it. But what if she got the actual kissing wrong? When she voices this concern, the other girls in their circle on the floor assume Diana is thinking of a boy, and she is both annoyed and relieved when Anne goes along with them.

 

To each other, Diana and Anne keep their promise of a bosom friendship that might last a lifetime. Diana will never want another bosom friend; she has told Anne as much, and as they walk to school arm in arm Diana thinks of her aunt who spent her life with a bosom friend. She knows Anne likes Aunt Josephine, so perhaps through her example she can make Anne see the appeal.

”She has come to stay with us for at least a month. She is grieving the loss of her companion,” Diana explains. Then, to make sure Anne understands the parallel, she gives her a meaningful look: ”Her _best friend forever and ever_.”

Anne seems to follow. She grants Diana a shy smile, and Diana is so thrilled at being understood that she dares to rest her temple against Anne’s. In spite of the snow beneath their feet she feels warmth spread from that small point of contact; it is as if all the wild and lively energy that is Anne seeps into Diana’s head, then neck, then side.

”Neither of them married. They lived with each other their whole lives,” she says quietly as the warmth settles in her lower stomach. It is comforting and unsettling at the same time; this very physical connection she has with Anne. So strong, apparently, it lets Anne sense what is in Diana’s heart:

"I'd live with you forever if I could,” Anne says, and Diana’s hands want to reach out, to solidify their bond beyond words. Until Anne adds: ”But I _know_ you will leave me the day you get married to some _wealthy, handsome gentleman_!”

Of all the times for Anne to turn to realism instead of using her imagination, Diana thinks to herself. Then she forces a laugh and looks away, because she, too, lacks the imagination necessary to protest; to suggest they might forget handsome gentlemen entirely and marry each other instead.


	2. FIGURING

Once switched on, the new light rendering Diana’s life blinding cannot be dimmed. Even though everyday life goes on after Aunt Josephine’s party, Diana’s perception of that life has changed. It feels foreign, or perhaps she is the foreigner. On the outside, looking in, probably not unlike how Anne first felt upon arriving in Avonlea. Diana, however, has grown up on the island. She never expected to feel alienated here.

 

Anne continues to share her stories, but they, too, have changed for Diana. She always knew her imagination did not measure up to Anne’s, but now she is painfully aware of the implications when she participates in Anne’s scenarios: Diana is not imagining anything; she is never pretending. Anne’s stories are but a thin veil shrouding the fact that Diana is always herself.

Now that the veil has been lifted to her, she can no longer fully relax around Anne. She is constantly analysing and second-guessing her own actions, not merely seeing the world, but also herself, from the outside. It is exhausting.

Like the time when the topic of proposals comes up. The members of The Avonlea Story Club are sitting on the floor of Anne’s secret cabin. Ruby is sharing gossip as usual; she believes their teacher is about to ask for Prissy’s hand in marriage. Anne is decidedly unimpressed by it all, and Diana misses the twinkle that is normally brought out in Anne’s eyes when a conversation turns to romance. In the old days, before the summer soiree, she would probably have caught Anne’s hand and proposed to her. To stir her friend’s imagination, she would have told herself. Now she knows this would be little more than a half-truth; she wants to stir so much more than that. She wants Anne’s eyes to twinkle at Diana specifically, not at some imagined romance. The simple act of holding Anne’s hand has become heavy with meaning, so Diana settles for a substitute: She reached for and proposes to Ruby instead. She can feel Anne watching them curiously. When Ruby says ‘no’, Diana definitely hears Anne sigh. Whether from disappointment or relief at Ruby’s response, Diana does not know, but the difference matters much too much to her, and she does not dare meet Anne’s gaze lest her friend find out.

There is another, similar situation soon after that. This time, Anne is the one pretending to propose. Her face, framed by hair that has not yet grown fully back, is solemn, her voice soft as she promises: " _For you_ I will build a castle, each brick forged in my heart with the fire of my transcendent love." She is talking to Ruby, not Diana, but the two of them are seated next to each other on the floor, so it is no wonder Diana feels the effect as strongly as if the words were spoken to her. After all, Anne’s gaze would only need to glide a few inches to the left to focus on Diana instead of Ruby. Diana wishes Anne would look at her, _see_ her, yet also finds comfort in the fact that she does not. She knows her cheeks are blushing, because she also knows the particular love she wants from Anne is neither discreet nor transcendent.

 

Sometimes the love she has for Anne, wants from Anne, feels downright primitive.

Like the times when Anne goes on and on and on about wanting to beat Gilbert academically, or just about Gilbert in general. Diana wants to beat Gilbert herself, but in a far more literal way than what Anne has in mind. It is a shocking realisation at first; Diana is not normally a violent person.

Then there is the new teacher, Miss Stacy, who gallops into town on a motor-cycle. She is neither constricted by a corset nor a narrow mind and makes Anne dreamy-eyed. ”A kindred spirit!” Anne declares then does her utmost to impress the newcomer. Diana feels ignored and cannot help but enjoy it when Anne’s attempts fall flat.

”I made a terrible impression on beautiful Miss Stacy! Anne Shirley-Cuthbert… _Appalling, Stupid, Clueless_!”

”You are being too hard on yourself,” Diana says half-heartedly. As a friend, she has a duty to cheer up Anne. As someone wanting Anne to herself, she would rather make her give up on Miss Stacy entirely. It is a conundrum, and when Anne moves on from _beautiful_ Miss Stacy to _clever_ Gilbert it is entirely too much.

Diana identifies the unpleasant feeling in her chest, and it does not make her proud. She also recognizes that this feeling has little to do with the particular complications of having fallen in love with someone of her own gender: Diana is _jealous_. It is as banal as it is unbearable, and she is desperate to talk to someone about it. She can think of only one suitable candidate.

 

* * * * *

 

“You won’t tell my parents, will you?” Diana mumbles into her hot cocoa. The lip of the cup is gilded. Everything in Aunt Josephine’s home is exquisite.

Aunt Josephine herself is formidable in her burgundy velvet dress with white lace ornaments, a stark contrast to the deep laughter and voice that seem to come from her chest rather than her mouth. “And reduce your opportunities for other enriching adventures? Never, my child.”

Diana already knew she could trust her aunt with this visit, but it feels nice to have it confirmed in words. She knows she can trust her with private feelings, too, but is not quite sure how to bring them up. First, she needs to get something else out of the way. She takes a deep breath, then puts the cup down and looks her aunt in the eye. ”I know I disappointed you at your soiree.”

The elderly woman barely moves a muscle. "I got the impression that _I_ had disappointed _you_."

”No!” The word bursts from Diana’s lips. It feels nothing like an oncoming explosion, more like a spoken sigh of relief. Like something is righting itself between the two of them, allowing Diana to carefully venture on. ”It's just… at the time I didn't know how much I _didn't_ know. I’m sorry my thinking was narrow. I understand so much more now," she adds in a near whisper, and perhaps it is her tone of voice, perhaps something else entirely, that makes Aunt Josephine tilt her head and look at her curiously. Though not at all unkindly. Diana feels a little exposed regardless and averts her gaze.

”My parents… You invited them, too. Had they been able to make it to your party… You must have known they would _find out_ ,” she says vaguely, hoping her aunt will catch the meaning in spite of her lack of eloquence.

Diana can hear the layers of Aunt Josephine’s dress move with her shrug. ”I knew. But they will think of it what they will. It took losing Gertrude to make me truly realise how short life is,” she adds a little wistfully. ”I am _not_ going to let others dictate how to live what is left of mine.”

” _I think I am like you and Gertrude_.” It was not supposed to come out like that. Diana was going to slowly build up to her revelation, to control it rather than let herself be controlled by it. Now it feels as if the revelation has been spoken on her behalf and belongs to someone else.

Until Diana looks up and finds nothing but understanding and love and the very opposite of surprise in her aunt’s gaze. She is being _seen_ , she realises, and perhaps not for the first time.

”You have a life of such joy before you,” her aunt says earnestly as she moves her chair closer to Diana’s. ”Not without hardship or bumps in the road. But where life is short, the world is so very wide, dear heart!”

Diana closes her eyes at the feel of a warm, wrinkled hand against her cheek. She leans into it and wishes she could somehow soak up the years and years of experiences carved into every line across her aunt’s palm. But she will have to live her own experience, grow her own wrinkles. As terrifying as it seems, it also holds endless possibilities, she thinks for the first time.

Again, her aunt seems to understand what she lacks words to express. “Despite what you have been raised to believe, your life doesn't have to be an exact replica of your parents’. Perhaps you’d like more than keeping a house. Perhaps you want to marry out of love. I did, in my own way.”

Diana already knows this. On the wall behind her is a photo of Gertrude with a flower sticking out of the buttonhole of her black jacket. Josephine is clad in a white dress. Gertrude is leaning over her, and they both wear looks of utter adoration. Diana has seen the photo countless times, but only at her last visit did she realise it was a wedding picture. How blind she had been.

“Gertrude and I lived a full and wonderful life together, and I have no regrets!” Aunt Josephine, now widowed, states firmly. “That's all you really have to decide, Diana. To live a life with no regrets."

It sounds so simple, and perhaps it is. Simpler, at least, than Diana thought when she last visited her aunt and had her perception of love turned upside down. However, there remains the decidedly _not_ simple question of whether Diana’s love is or ever can be reciprocated. She has to talk to aunt Josephine about that, too. She needs to share it with someone.

“I may be able to decide that for myself, but I cannot decide on behalf of another person,” Diana points out. She frowns.

“Do you have a particular person in mind?” Aunt Josephine asks. She has withdrawn her hand and is pouring more cocoa, perhaps sensing Diana’s need for space to settle her thoughts.

“Yes,” Diana admits. “But I haven’t told her.” It is the first time she dares to use the proper pronoun, and it feels like a point of no return, even though in reality Diana passed that point a long time ago. “I don’t know how she would react if she knew.”

“Well. Are you going to tell me more about her or will I have to guess?” There are creases around Aunt Josephine’s eyes, threatening to spread and erupt into a smile.

Diana rolls her eyes in a way that probably seems very young. But she _is_ young, so why should she pretend any different? Pretending was never her forte. “I believe little guessing is required,” she says drily, and Aunt Josephine laughs.

“Then I will abstain from guessing and only say what I see: That Anne cares deeply for you. She would certainly never push you away for loving her.”

Diana knows this, too; has seen how unafraid Anne is where emotions are concerned. Has noticed her complete lack of prejudice against Aunt Josephine and Gertrude’s love for one another. She is not truly scared of losing Anne’s friendship; but she is jealous and full of yearning and mostly worried she will never be more than Anne’s friend. The fact that the world is wide and might hold other potential bosom friends in some undefined distant future is of little comfort to her. Diana would rather be happily in love right now, age fourteen, she thinks with a sigh. “She might _care_ for me, but she will never love me the way I love her.”

“Are you quite sure of that?” Aunt Josephine wonders. “To me, Anne seems like someone with many possible outcomes.”

Diana shrugs. Is she quite sure? “She just… Anne is so very caught up in the kind of romances found in books. And _this_ is not something you can read about in a book.” She is being vague again. But this time she cannot blame her own lack of eloquence; there simply is no word for the kind of love she and Aunt Josephine are discussing. Anne could probably come up with one if she dared to ask her.

“That is… not entirely accurate, but you are probably right in assuming that Anne has not read any of the books available on the topic.”

Diana’s eyes whip up at that. Surely she misheard her aunt? Before she manages to enquire more about available books, however, Aunt Josephine continues:

“Did you know that Anne’s favourite novel was also Gertrude’s? Anne claimed they must be kindred spirits. To her, the book was a port in a storm. Perhaps you should read it.”

Aunt Josephine rises slowly, majestically, and leaves the room only to return moments later with a book in her hand. “It might cast light on the kind of romance Anne years for,” she says, “or it might not. In any case, I think it worth reading.”

There is a small thud when Aunt Josephine drops the book on the table; it punctuates their conversation, Diana thinks, and makes it impossible to argue. So she simply picks up the copy of ‘Jane Eyre’ and hopes there is more to it than its worn cover.


	3. FICTION

 

 

 

 

 

> “I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.” - Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Diana is reading in bed. It is still early in the year, and the sun sets equally early, but she has drawn the curtains to her room just the same. She wanted to create a small, private space for herself. Alone like this, she can easily hear Anne’s voice as she scans the pages of the book her friend so treasures. Anne, like the protagonist of ‘Jane Eyre’, is the very definition of free and independent.

In fact, Diana remembers something Anne once stated with regards to marriage and freedom: "I have always wanted to be a bride, but I don't really expect to be a wife. In any case I am _certainly_ not going to give myself over to someone and be a pretty-ish piece of property without a voice or ambition.”

So not the typical fairy tale romance, Diana thinks to herself with a small smile before turning the page. 

 

 

 

 

 

> “I can live alone, if self-respect and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld, or offered only at a price I cannot afford to give.” - Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Diana blinks as a memory takes her back to her parents’ kitchen. Ruby intended to win Gilbert’s heart by the means of a pie and had enrolled Anne and Diana in the baking of it. Although contributing her fair share, Anne was verbally protesting her way through the whole thing. “Being a cook shouldn't be very high on the list of romantic attributes, if you ask me,” she had said with disdain in her voice.

As always, Diana had been amused by her friend’s antics and not thought it through when she asked Anne to elaborate on said list. Really, she had just wanted her to go on talking.

Anne, however, had been dead serious when she replied: "My _brain_ , Diana. My _personality_. Who I am. I'd like to believe that's what _truly_ matters. If romance matters at all, which it _doesn't_."

Ruby and Diana had giggled at that, Diana had even shaken her head in mock exasperation, but now she wonders if Anne had been the sensible one that day. Diana, too, wants to be loved for _her_ , not for the dresses she has been given or the piano she has been taught to play. Though she does not mind it when Anne compliments either. But brains and personality are certainly more important and, she thinks, have preciously little to do with gender.

 

 

 

 

 

> “Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts, as much as their brothers do; (…) It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex.” - Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Diana is surprised by how critical the book is of the roles traditionally assigned to men and women, respectively. It is not at all a perspective she would have expected to find in a romantic novel. She never realised this sort of … _political thinking_ was even compatible with romance. Clearly, this book is the proponent of different ideas than those she has grown up with. In Diana’s household, the division of labour is strict. Her father takes care of any and all financial business, even when he seems to have little nose for it. Her mother takes care of choosing curtains, of hosting tea parties, and of turning her daughters into proper ladies like herself. Most would probably consider her parents’ marriage an ideal one, but now that she ponders it, she does not want to replicate it herself, and it is obvious that Anne does not either. On the contrary, Anne has spoken passionately about the need for equality in a marriage. "I think I need to reimagine the whole concept of marriage,” she has once told Diana. “A marriage should be between _equal partners_ , not just husband and wife, and neither should have to abandon their heart's desire. I've come up with a new name for both parties, because I believe they should be named _the same_ : Life mates.”

Anne's suggestion of using one common name downplays gender, Diana realises. The more she reads from Anne’s favourite romance, and the more she remembers Anne's stated opinions on romance, the more she feels like she never truly listened to her friend before. Anne likes the story of Guinevere and Lancelot, but clearly that has less to do with the notion of noble men and damsels in distress than Diana thought it did. Perhaps it has nothing what so ever to do with men and women. After all, Anne chose Diana for the part of Lancelot without giving her girlishness a second thought.

 

 

 

 

 

> "I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you – especially when you are near me, as now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame.” - Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Anne has at one point suggested ‘marriage’ should be renamed ‘love bond’, and if Diana found it queer at the time, she now finds herself wholeheartedly agreeing. The term describes her feelings for Anne much better than she herself was ever able to. It is indeed as if Anne has reached in and tied a string around Diana’s heart, and now she is inadvertently pulling at Diana in everything she does. But if Anne pulls at Diana, then surely it means Anne is somehow bound by the same string; that they are tied together? Diana knows she is taking the metaphor too literally. She cannot help it; it is how language works for her.

In any case, it has become clear to her that Anne’s romantic ideas are not based on gender. But there is a difference between ideas and reality. Anne has spoken of Gilbert in ways that could be indicative of a crush. Yet she has behaved in much the same way around Miss Stacy. Diana has been trying to ascertain whether Anne might be like Aunt Josephine and herself, or if she is like Ruby, Prissy, Josie, and the vast majorities of all other females. Is it possible that Anne is something else _entirely_? Diana wonders. Whenever Anne has spoken of love unaided by literary quotations she has done so in ways that defy categorisation. It is not a love found between men and women specifically or between sweethearts specifically, and there seems to be no hierarchy for it. “Love comes in so many forms,” Anne had said on their journey back from Aunt Josephine’s party, ”And how can there be anything wrong with a life if it’s spent with a person you love?"

 

 

 

 

 

> “Now I remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had the courage to go forth into its expanse, to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils.” - Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Diana recognizes the quote immediately. It is the passage Anne chose to read in Gertrude’s stead at the summer soiree. In her mind, she hears Anne speak loudly and clearly and directly to her: _Go forth and seek and have courage_.

And so Diana leaves the book on her bedside table without finishing it. She has to look for resolution beyond stories and metaphors. She has been putting off confronting Anne long enough, she decides. After all, deep down Diana knows she has nothing to fear from Anne. She dares not entertain the even deeper feeling that maybe, _maybe_ , she has something to win.


	4. FACT

Marilla lets Diana in without commenting on the late hour. Anne is in her room upstairs, and Diana knows the way. The door is cracked open and a flicker of light seeps into the hallway. Diana intends to knock, to let her presence be known, but freezes on the doorstep at the sight of her friend.

“I'll take _you_ , matched to my intellect, proponent of my happiness, friend of my heart to be my _life mate_ ,” Anne is telling her own mirror image. She is wearing what must be Marilla’s unused wedding dress and holding a candle in her hands. The shine from it dances across the angles of her cheeks and the hollow of her collarbones and Diana forgets to breathe.

Then Anne looks up, past the shoulder of her own reflection, and catches Diana staring in the glass. “Diana!” she exclaims happily and twirls around so quickly her veil momentarily creates the illusion of a halo. “I was just pretending to marry myself, but it is a game much better suited for two. You simply have to join in!” She floats towards Diana, grasps both of her hands and pulls her in. Or perhaps it is the invisible string pulling her in. In any case, Diana feels dizzy.

“You wish for me to be a groom?”

Anne shrugs. “Or you can be a second bride. Here; take the veil, I think I can do with just the dress.”

Before Diana has time to ponder Anne’s openness to the idea of there being not one, but two brides; before she can ask for clarification or start the conversation she came here for, she feels Anne’s fingers in her hair. They delicately fasten the thin cloth behind Diana’s ears, and when they gently frame her face she is overwhelmed by the nearness of her friend. She can do nothing but follow as Anne weaves another one of her imaginative stories around them.

“I'll take _you_ , matched to my intellect, proponent of my happiness, friend of my heart to be my _life mate_.” Anne repeats her words from earlier, but this time she is looking Diana in the eye and speaking to her. Except she is _not_. This is not reality to Anne; it is a _story_. Only, the subtle difference is difficult to hold on to when Anne offers Diana everything she wishes for: “Let us dance _together_ as equal partners through the years!”

Diana can feel Anne’s breath, smelling vaguely of rosemary, on her own lips. She needs to put distance between them before she forgets herself entirely and closes what little is left. She must remind herself that this is not real; that she should respond with fiction, not truth. But in fact, Diana does both when she quotes Anne and Gertrude’s favourite book: “I ask you to pass through life at my side – to be my second self, and best earthly companion.”

Anne’s eyes widen and for a moment they are themselves, just like Diana prefers it. “You’ve read ‘Jane Eyre’?”

There is surprise and awe and something else in Anne’s voice that makes Diana lean closer to her friend. Their foreheads are nearly touching. “I did,” she says with a smile. “I like it.”

Anne’s eyes are as warm as the hands still cradling Diana’s face. Diana truly can no longer recall why she came by, but this right now seems like a reason in and of itself. Just the two of them, close, like this. Connected.

Until Anne breaks into a wide grin and lets her hands drop. “You _have_ to be Mr Rochester! Then I will be Jane. I cannot believe I didn’t think of that sooner. It is _absolutely perfect_!”

With the return of fiction, their connection breaks. Diana does _not_ want to be Rochester or Jane or anyone other than herself, but Anne has such an eager, delighted gleam in her eye and Diana cannot bear to extinguish it. So she plays along, as she often has, even if imagination was never her strong suit.

Anne tilts her head in thought, then puts a hand to her heart and cries out in her most dramatic voice: "There is no one to meddle, _dear_ _sir_! I have no kindred to interfere!”

Diana is dumbfounded. The discrepancy between how she feels, as _herself_ , about Anne and the fact that Anne is calling her ‘sir’ is nearly enough to pull her back to the conversation that needs to take place. But again, she fails to keep up with Anne’s imagination.

“No,” Anne says with conviction and a headshake, “this doesn’t work. You have to take off the veil. And we should skip to the end bit. It is much more romantic.” She adds the last part dreamily, then looks expectantly at Diana.

Diana removes the veil and places it carefully on the table holding Anne’s mirror. When she turns back towards her friend, Anne is still watching her, clearly waiting for her to do something, but Diana is at a loss.

“You are _blind_!” Anne finally says, as if that should be obvious. “Here. Like _this_.” Careful fingertips touch Diana’s face, close her eyes with a gesture that feels so much like a caress Diana nearly moans. Again, this discrepancy between what there _is_ and what Diana _wishes_ it were… It feels like a weight upon her chest constricting her breathing. Fortunately, Anne has apparently decided that Jane should speak first.

“Do you think I feared him in his blind ferocity?” Anne is talking to someone who is not there. A reader, an audience, perhaps Mr Rochester. Definitely _not_ Diana. “If you do, you little know me! Soon I should dare to drop a kiss on that brow of rock, and on those lips so sternly sealed beneath it,” she performs.

Diana simply stands there, eyes closed, unable to pretend.

“Go on,” she hears Anne’s slightly impatient voice after a beat. “Now _you_ should tell me all my sisters have fled before me, and then you ask me to kiss you and embrace you before I go,” she instructs.

Diana sighs quietly. When she gives in and does as she is told – asks _Jane_ to kiss her, even though she only wants _Anne_ to kiss her – it also sounds like a sigh.

If Anne notices, she says nothing. She continues the game; only this time her dramatic voice is softer and closer to Diana’s ear. “So I press my lips to his once _brilliant_ and now _rayless_ eyes,” she says, and suddenly there is the quick press of lips against Diana’s right eyelid. They are gone before she can react.

The second time is different. Diana knows how close Anne is, feels their breaths mingling, senses her friend’s warmth. More importantly; she _expects_ Anne’s kiss.

“I sweep his hair from his brow and kiss that, too,” Anne declares, and all of Diana is momentarily reduced to her eyebrows. She never considered them particularly sensitive, but when Anne kisses one it sends a jolt through Diana as if the kiss was much more than a barely-there touch.

The smile is evident in Anne’s voice when she half-quotes: “This is when the conviction that this is _reality_ seizes you.”

Diana wants to simultaneously laugh and cry at Anne’s, or Jane Eyre’s, phrasing. _But this is not reality_ , she thinks; that is the crux of her problem. She has to open her eyes now, and when she does, she is unable to imagine that this is Jane in front of her. She sees only Anne, her bosom friend, whom she has fallen deeply in love with, and Anne is leaning slowly towards her. Diana’s gaze drops to Anne’s mouth as she closes in on Diana’s. A hand’s width is reduced to a hair’s width and oh, how she has wondered about Anne’s mouth; what it would feel and taste like, and now she is seconds from finding out. When she feels Anne’s lips graze her, the impossibility of pretending comes crashing down on Diana. She cannot, will not pretend. Not when it comes to _this_. And so she jumps backwards, flees backwards until her legs hit Anne’s bed. Then she sits and scoots even further away from her friend. Up against the wall, curling in on herself as much as she can, hugging her knees protectively in much the same way she did at the summer soiree. Only, this time she does not try to hold the explosion in. She lets her tears fall freely and gives up any attempt at breathing evenly.

“Diana?” The terror in Anne’s voice should make Diana feel guilty, but she takes comfort in the fact that her friend has been shaken into the reality that Diana is always stuck with. “What’s wrong? I hope I didn’t hurt you, I didn’t mean to hurt you.” Anne is rambling, reaching for words and for Diana simultaneously. Diana does not have room to pull away from the hands than gently try to pry hers away from her body. “It is just a _game_ ,” Anne says desperately, and it the entirely wrong thing to say.

“It isn’t a game to me!” Diana admits, and Anne, to her credit, only freezes for a fraction of a second. Then her hands tighten their hold on Diana’s wrists. Even when Diana spills everything she has hitherto held back. “It was _never_ a game to me. I told you; I told you the very first time we met! Imagination is not my strong suit. It is _yours_. You pretend we are these romantic heroes, but I can't pretend.” Diana sniffs in what must be a most unladylike manner. She cannot bring herself to care.

Anne sounds confused. “But you play our games _well_! You made a very convincing Mr Rochester just now.” Her thumbs are stroking Diana’s wrists in a manner clearly intended to soothe.

Diana yanks her arms away and roughly wipes at her tear-streaked cheeks. “I did _not_ , Anne. I was being myself. I always am. You imagine a brave knight, a wicked prince, a love-stricken Rochester, but really it’s _just me_. I am the love-stricken one,” she says harshly. Then adds in a near-whisper: “And I want _you_ to kiss me. Not Guinevere or Jane or anyone else.”

Anne says nothing, but has not fled the room either, and so Diana eventually braves her fears and spreads the fingers covering her face so she can peek at her friend. Indeed, Anne is still there; seated on the edge of the bed and for the first time in their entire friendship at a loss for words. Eventually what comes out of her mouth is: “Well, if the love-stricken Rochester was all you, then the wickedness and bravery must be you, as well.”

It is so very far from what Diana expected Anne to say that she feels laughter bubbling up inside her. Inappropriate, given the circumstances, but a relief just the same, especially when Anne starts to giggle as well. Once more, Diana allows Anne to pry her arms away from her body. She does not let go of Diana’s hands afterwards, Diana notices. She might not know where they will go from here, but at least nothing has been broken between them. There is silence, but it does not feel heavy. If anything, there is lightness to it, a sense of possibility.

“How long have you felt like this?” Anne eventually asks. It is a quiet question that demands nothing, but Diana answers just the same.

“I can’t remember ever _not_ feeling like this,” she admits. “But I only recently realised that being in love with you was even possible.”

“Of course.” Anne’s gaze flickers and turns inwards as she, too, realises something. “The summer soiree… That’s why you were upset.” Her gaze returns to Diana.

Diana shrugs. It is only a tiny movement of one shoulder; her hands remain in Anne’s. “I was scared,” she says. “Still am. A little.”

“Of me?” Anne frowns deeply, and Diana recognizes a familiar current in her fingertips. It is accompanied by an urge to gently straighten the wrinkles across her friend’s forehead. She folds her fingers into her own palms instead, and Anne responds by squeezing them.

“Never _of_ you,” Diana assures Anne. “At first I was scared of myself, I think, of what I was feeling. Later I became a little worried that I might lose you.”

“You will _never_ lose me,” Anne says with more authority than one would think a fourteen-year-old capable of. “I am your _sworn bosom friend for life_ , remember? And I love you.” Anne says it matter-of-factly, and it is impossible for Diana to discern how she means the declaration exactly. Perhaps because Anne is unsure herself. She is currently biting her lower lip, the one Diana considers luscious and almost kissed earlier, and Diana has to patiently allow her friend to come to her own conclusion.

  
* * * * *

  
“Can we try something?”

Anne is still chewing her lip and gazes uncertainly at Diana through carrot-coloured lashes. Diana is quite certain she will be unable to deny Anne any request right now.

“Can I kiss you, the way we did before?”

Except for that one. “I can’t play any more games. It hurts.” Diana sighs and withdraws her hands a second time.

“Not a game,” Anne quickly corrects. Then she takes a deep breath to ready herself for a speech. “You were right in pointing out that our imaginations work differently. I can easily see you as a knight and myself as the maiden yearning for said knight. Or for Mr Rochester.”

Diana winces at the memory of what has so very nearly finally happened in Anne’s story, but never in real life.

“I am proficient at pretending to woo or be wooed by someone you pretend to be,” Anne continues with a characteristic lack of humility that almost makes Diana smile in spite of everything. “However, due to my talent for staying in character I find myself without any inkling as to what a romance between you and I might be like. I believe the sensible solution to this conundrum is for us to repeat what we did earlier. Only-“ For the first time, there is hesitation is Anne’s voice: “Only this time you should be you, and I should be… you know, just me.”

Anne’s lack of eloquence is how Diana knows this, right now, is not a quote or an ideal. This is simply the two of them, insecure and faulty and _real_. And this is why Diana decides to go along with Anne one last time. “Okay,” she says and closes her eyes like she did earlier.

Again, she feels Anne lean closer, feels Anne’s fingers remove a lock of hair from her face. Again, she holds her own breath.

Then Anne’s hand is suddenly withdrawn. Diana opens her eyes and finds Anne flustered and clearly embarrassed. “I’m sorry, I’m not sure I can do this,” she says miserably.

Although Anne cannot possibly be as miserable as Diana feels. That’s that, she thinks; the answer I was looking for: “You don’t want to.”

“No! It’s not _that_!” Anne shakes her head so fast it must be painful. “I mean it literally: I’m not sure I can do this. I have no experience with kissing.”

“That’s not true. You kissed me earlier this evening.”

“ _Jane_ kissed _Rochester_ ,” Anne says exasperatedly. “ _I_ , on the other hand, have never kissed _anyone_.”

“Of course,” Diana says, understanding dawning on her even if she lacks the imagination necessary to fully put herself in Anne’s shoes. She has to rely on her senses instead. She sees and hears Anne breathing faster and shallower than normally. Her friend is also blinking more often than she usually does, and her pupils are dilated. Anne is not put off by what they are discussing, Diana realises; she is simply _nervous_. What to do about that?

“You called me brave and wicked,” Diana says slowly. “Perhaps I could summon a bit of that courage and wickedness and kiss you first?” She actually feels braver when stating she _could be_. She feels sure enough of herself and her wicked abilities to smile genuinely at Anne.

Anne nods wordlessly, another testament to how insecure she is feeling.

As soon as she has Anne’s consent, Diana leans forward. When she takes Anne’s face between her hands her friend’s eyes flutter closed. Diana strokes her cheekbones affectionately with her thumbs and finds that Anne’s freckles are not actually dancing under her fingertips even if they always seem lively. “You can open your eyes,” she gently suggests. “It’s just you and me. And if you tell me to stop, I will.”

Unlike Anne’s freckles the tiny spots in Anne’s eyes are definitely dancing. They pull Diana in until Anne’s eyes fill out her entire field of vision. She was going to kiss Anne’s brow first, then perhaps her cheek, but now their noses graze each other, and Diana can sense the heat of Anne’s mouth. She covers it with her own. It is only a slight pressure of lips against lips; Diana does not dare to move against Anne in any way. She is posing a question with this kiss and will not force the answer. Anne, too, stays still. At least, Diana thinks she does, until she feels something tickling her sides. When she realises Anne wants to _hold_ her she slides her fingers into her friend’s hair. She pulls back, but only enough to peck Anne’s lips a second time and a third time and a fourth time and… Diana loses count as she becomes enthralled by the sound of their kisses. It is, quite possibly, the most incredible thing Diana has ever heard. Until a small whimper escapes Anne’s mouth between kisses and Diana decides she likes that sound even better. She wants to coax it from Anne repeatedly, though only if Anne wants the same thing, and so Diana wills herself to withdraw enough to properly take in Anne’s expression. Her cheeks are scarlet, her lips possibly plumper than usually, and her gaze flickers. But Anne is on the verge of smiling. “For someone without an imagination you are _quite_ talented at that,” she mumbles shyly.

Then Anne does smile. All gums and dimples and unlike anything out of a book, and Diana feels warm all over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you squint, you will find a nod to 'Desert Hearts' as well as to 'Fucking Åmål'/'Show Me Love' hidden in this fic. It is Yuletide, after all; a time to celebrate the classics ;)


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